Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Voting is open
Do gyrocopters burn fuel to fly, or they are powered solely by runes? If it's the first, what is the fuel?
Gyrocopters are way too newfangled for Runes. Only the most radical would apply the most basic of runes.

The actual description in the army books says that it uses a "lightweight steam engine". The fuel is never truly elaborated on. Gyrocopters do have a steam gun that they use the vapor to shoot at enemies.

Annnnd Boney Mathilde'd me. Eh, I'm still going to post this since I spent the time looking it up.
 
Rapid response over scouting, who will encounter (run into) the forest creatures on their terms anyway.

[x] [GREY] Standing ready to respond with the Tzar and Boyars
[x] [GOLD] Patrolling the path with the city rotas
[x] [ICE] Guarding the forest rotas as they expand and fortify the path
 
By the way Boney, of all the books you listed, this is the one that I'm most interested in reading. Since you have it, how heavy of a read is it? I've been thinking of getting to the Mahabharata and Ramayana because I've always been curious, and was wondering how much reading was required for them.
 
I liked it when I tried, but the pacing is very different; it was hard to read in the way Beowulf was hard, if that makes sense?

Also, apparently, the soma that the poets wrote under the influence of? I saw a research paper with an ancient cup and a spectrographic analysis, and they said it was a mix of hashish, opium, and ephedrine. Which sounds baller as fuck, ngl.
 
By the way Boney, of all the books you listed, this is the one that I'm most interested in reading. Since you have it, how heavy of a read is it? I've been thinking of getting to the Mahabharata and Ramayana because I've always been curious, and was wondering how much reading was required for them.

The version I have is the Hare Krishna translation and commentary, and every couple of lines of transliterated sanskrit there's both a word-for-word translation and the author's translation of the meaning, and following that a paragraph or two of explanation of those verses. That makes it very approachable as a religious text, but definitely makes it denser that if it was just the translation, and I can't say one way or the other how accurate it might be to the source material. Considering the translated text by itself it's definitely very understandable, so if you can find a translation that works for you - and I understand there's quite a few versions of both the Mahabharata and Ramayana out there - then it shouldn't be unreasonably heavy, though it would probably be exhaustingly long unless you go for abridged versions.
 
Last edited:
I have been doing a re-read, jumping around to the parts of the quest I had the most fun with nothing exhaustive, but I cane across this exchange roughly three and a half years ago, before the expedition

As the discussion veers into a comparison of local clothiers for Maximilian to acquire the fancier robes he's now entitled to, Gehenna sidles over to you. "What's this one here?"

You peer at the Rune on your staff she's pointing at. "Eltharin... oh, that would be Anath Raema in Her aspect of the Stalker. Elven Goddess, like Kurnous but crankier, as I understand it."

"Huh." She frowns thoughtfully. "Bunch of things just made sense. I stamped out a Cult of Styriss on Ostermark a while back that was hitting way above its weight, this was one of the symbols they had on their shrines."


Ostermark is the land we were just in and the one which had some of that disturbance which we now know to be associated with Drycha for at least a year, but if might have been more, in which case the rise of the darker elven hunt gods may have something to do with the matter. I do not think Drycha is personally going around and teaching humans how to commune with the Goddess of the Savage hunt, but she might have empowered them in passage, or someone in her entourage may have something to do with it.
 
When we caught that look at Ranald, how big was he? Ursun and the Horned Rat are both very big, which got me wondering whether Ranald is also very big or just dude-sized.
 
There's also a bunch of books I'm not sure whether they best fit on the 'religion' shelf, or are more history or psychology or philosophy. Like, Faust? Nietzsche? The Screwtape Letters? Brothers Grimm? Books on psychology and ethics by the Dalai Lama? Freemasons? The lines can get very blurred

I work in a bookshop, and this is an issue we deal with daily. We have a "philosophy" section, a "psychology" section, a "spirituality and religion" section (which is hilarious because we have tarot and astrology books next to C.S.Lewis's essays on Catholicism, the Qur'an, and biographies of the Dalai Lama), and a "self help" section (not to be confused with the "health and wellbeing" section).

And don't even get me started on the four different politics sections we have ("politics", "20th century British", "Feminism", "Identity and Race") or how mythology and folklore is divided between history, fiction, and spirituality.

Trying to find the right section for a book is difficult because there's so much overlap, so we tend to fall back on "if I was a customer who wanted this specific book, where would I look first?" and shelve it there.

Say you've got Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology. Where do you shelve it:

A) Sci-fi and Fantasy
B) Viking History
C) Spirituality
D) Fiction A-Z

There's no correct answer. Most of his work is in the Sci-Fi and Fantasy section, so you could put it there, or it could go with other mythology books in history, or it could go in the paganism section, or just throw it into fiction—which is where Stephen Fry's, Madeline Miller's, Pat Barker's, and Jennifer Saint's myth retellings are kept.

(What we actually do is keep it with his other works in fantasy because people are usually looking for Neil Gaiman books specifically rather than books on Norse Mythology).

The only real answer is "can your customers find it easily?"
 
When we caught that look at Ranald, how big was he? Ursun and the Horned Rat are both very big, which got me wondering whether Ranald is also very big or just dude-sized.

If you mean during Apotheosis Denied, there was no context to measure him against. But it's said that he sometimes manifests in the form of a human, and by all accounts he's normal-sized while doing so.
 
I work in a bookshop, and this is an issue we deal with daily. We have a "philosophy" section, a "psychology" section, a "spirituality and religion" section (which is hilarious because we have tarot and astrology books next to C.S.Lewis's essays on Catholicism, the Qur'an, and biographies of the Dalai Lama), and a "self help" section (not to be confused with the "health and wellbeing" section).

And don't even get me started on the four different politics sections we have ("politics", "20th century British", "Feminism", "Identity and Race") or how mythology and folklore is divided between history, fiction, and spirituality.

Trying to find the right section for a book is difficult because there's so much overlap, so we tend to fall back on "if I was a customer who wanted this specific book, where would I look first?" and shelve it there.

Say you've got Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology. Where do you shelve it:

A) Sci-fi and Fantasy
B) Viking History
C) Spirituality
D) Fiction A-Z

There's no correct answer. Most of his work is in the Sci-Fi and Fantasy section, so you could put it there, or it could go with other mythology books in history, or it could go in the paganism section, or just throw it into fiction—which is where Stephen Fry's, Madeline Miller's, Pat Barker's, and Jennifer Saint's myth retellings are kept.

(What we actually do is keep it with his other works in fantasy because people are usually looking for Neil Gaiman books specifically rather than books on Norse Mythology).

The only real answer is "can your customers find it easily?"
This is why libraries use the Dewey Decimal, and classify everything by treatment, rather than subject. And also why computers are a godsend for organizing books.
 
Im sure Shallaya appreciates that.
BRB asking for dislike rating
Wait so did they and do have sex in canon? No conceptual drank from the chalice stuff, just plain mammalian copulation?
They are gods, Sotek in particular is not a mammal....
They canonically (in this quest) have children, but they're metaphysical beings as much metaphor and belief as they are actual creatures. We have no idea how they fuck, but they do and again its probably a matter that they can if they want to.
 
Wait so did they and do have sex in canon? No conceptual drank from the chalice stuff, just plain mammalian copulation?
Canon is exceptionally vague on whether they even have a romantic relationship. There are several stories of Ranald's ascension and the chalice one is simply popular, and it's stated within that very story that it's not true by any means, and that Ranald was always a god and never human. In canon material, Shallya and Ranald don't even have all that strong of a connection outside those few myths. Certainly, the Cults don't really cooperate in any major ways or anything like that.

DL focuses on different aspects of Canon, which also means that certain parts that barely have any light shined on them gain more importance in the narrative and become central to it. Ranald's relationship with Shallya is one of those things. Mathilde's always been an avid supporter of the Ranald/Shallya narrative, and she even found out that apparently they have children. None of that is even alluded to in canon.
 
This is why libraries use the Dewey Decimal, and classify everything by treatment, rather than subject. And also why computers are a godsend for organizing books.

Many libraries do use Dewey Decimal, but it was created in 1876 and there's been 23 editions of that since then (the last one was in 2011, and I think a new edition is due in the next few years?). There are many different systems of organising books, and it's important for the head librarian to not only pick the one that most suits their collection, but also their patron's needs. For example, the Dewey system heavily favours Christianity in its religion section—sections 200 through 290 is almost exclusively for works on Christianity, whilst the entirety of Islam is filed solely under 297. If you have a large number of Muslims visiting your library for religious texts, then Dewey is the wrong system to use because it makes Islamic texts almost impossible to organise.

Dewey also favours literature written in English, followed by various European languages (modern and historical). Ancient Greek literature has six categories assigned to it (879, 880, 881, 885, 889) whilst literature in North and South American Native Languages has two (897, 898). This makes Dewey deeply inappropriate for any organisation that seeks to preserve and endorse native american languages.

Dewey's great, don't get me wrong, but it's designed for an Anglo-American audience, and shouldn't be seen as a universal system. Hell, I don't even think a universal system can exist at all. Instead, you need to work backwards—who are your patrons, what books do you need, how do you organise them.

That's kinda why I get so passionate about the library votes in the thread—many voters see Mathilde as the primary patron of the library, whilst I see the entire Karak as the primary patron. Neither view is wrong, but this difference in priority leads to wildly different ideas about what books the library needs.
 
but I cane across this exchange roughly three and a half years ago, before the expedition
You sucker punched me with the phrasing here. I thought you were talking about 3 and a half years ago in real life for a second there, and I was wonering how fast the passage of time was moving that so long had passed. I was sure we were on the K8P Expedition back then. Then I realised you were talking about in universe time.
For example, the Dewey system heavily favours Christianity in its religion section—sections 200 through 290 is almost exclusively for works on Christianity, whilst the entirety of Islam is filed solely under 297. If you have a large number of Muslims visiting your library for religious texts, then Dewey is the wrong system to use because it makes Islamic texts almost impossible to organise.
This is disappointing but not surprising. But I do remember the very large library I went to in my country using the Dewey Decimal system, and I live in a Muslim country. I can guarantee you we had a ton of Muslim texts back there. I can't really tell you what they did as a compromise, but I do know that a Muslim library was using Dewey. Probably a modified version.
 
Wait so did they and do have sex in canon? No conceptual drank from the chalice stuff, just plain mammalian copulation?
They are gods, they do whatever they want.

Mathilde actually once got lewd artwork of Ranald supping from Shallaya's "cup" as a gift for the about to be established shrine, so i find making crude jokes and innuendos about it from time to time to be great fun :V.

I wonder if she kept it :V
 
Last edited:
You sucker punched me with the phrasing here. I thought you were talking about 3 and a half years ago in real life for a second there, and I was wonering how fast the passage of time was moving that so long had passed. I was sure we were on the K8P Expedition back then. Then I realised you were talking about in universe time.

This is disappointing but not surprising. But I do remember the very large library I went to in my country using the Dewey Decimal system, and I live in a Muslim country. I can guarantee you we had a ton of Muslim texts back there. I can't really tell you what they did as a compromise, but I do know that a Muslim library was using Dewey. Probably a modified version.
Most libraries modify from the big systems.
At the very least to give their local literature exposure, but also to allow for finer sorting in any thematic strongpoints.

Like the library of a college or university with a lot of pedagogy courses will have more literature for that and thus make a finer division to organise that material.
 
This is disappointing but not surprising. But I do remember the very large library I went to in my country using the Dewey Decimal system, and I live in a Muslim country. I can guarantee you we had a ton of Muslim texts back there. I can't really tell you what they did as a compromise, but I do know that a Muslim library was using Dewey. Probably a modified version.

My guess would be that they heavily leaned into subcatagories: 297.0001-297.9999, or something like that. Which isn't ideal, because instead of looking for a three digit number you're now looking for a seven digit number, the first three of which are identical. As someone who spends all day looking at 13-digit ISBN's, I can assure you that fewer numbers=better.
 
They are gods, Sotek in particular is not a mammal....
They canonically (in this quest) have children, but they're metaphysical beings as much metaphor and belief as they are actual creatures. We have no idea how they fuck, but they do and again its probably a matter that they can if they want to.
DL focuses on different aspects of Canon, which also means that certain parts that barely have any light shined on them gain more importance in the narrative and become central to it. Ranald's relationship with Shallya is one of those things. Mathilde's always been an avid supporter of the Ranald/Shallya narrative, and she even found out that apparently they have children. None of that is even alluded to in canon.
Mathilde actually once got lewd artwork of Ranald supping from Shallaya's "cup" as a gift for the about to be established shrine, so i find making crude jokes and innuendos about it from time to time to be great fun :V.
So is the shipping of Ranald and Shallaya a popular thing in the Warhammer fanon or is this endemic to this quest?

I always thought the latter, but the comment I replied to made me rethink it and curious enough to ask the question.
 
So is the shipping of Ranald and Shallaya a popular thing in the Warhammer fanon or is this endemic to this quest?

I always thought the latter, but the comment I replied to made me rethink it and curious enough to ask the question.
Outside this quest? I've barely seen anyone talking about the two in relation to each other. People usually mention Ranald when they're cursing him out for giving them bad luck when rolling for Winds of Magic in Total Warhammer. Shallya is mentioned, but not really in relation to Ranald. I mean, I'm still relatively new to "fanon" so I can't say much, but I'm going to be real with you and say that this quest shaped Ranald's narrative in a way that no other piece of canon or fanon work has ever done.

I legitimately don't think anything else approached this quest in terms of Ranald focus and development. If you go to, like, Dynasty of Dynamic Alcoholism for example, you will find a lot of Ranald dislike. I think I've seen people who genuinely hate him or something? I don't know. I don't think anyone views him positively there. The POV character treats him like a nuisance of a god, even after he became faithful. It's weird but I suppose it makes sense for upper class citizens to view him that way.
 
So is the shipping of Ranald and Shallaya a popular thing in the Warhammer fanon or is this endemic to this quest?

I always thought the latter, but the comment I replied to made me rethink it and curious enough to ask the question.
It's not just fanon, it is a legitimate theological debate within the Cult of Ranald whether he truly loved Shallya or swindled her, and which one should be seen as more praiseworthy.
 
Voting is open
Back
Top